Well, this is annoying. Yet again I’m compelled to comment on Spanish racism. Given that this particular type of confusing and misguided display seems to be coming so frequently from Spain of late, does this mean my commentary is also in danger of becoming racist (against the Spanish)? I do wish they’d stop.

Here we see Spanish Grand Prix fans showing their dissaproval of Lewis Hamilton, current Formula 1 World Champion. Richard Herring analyses their non-logic here.

More recently, reports have emerged of a Spanish website attacking Hamilton in an openly racist way. Apparently more than 16,000 people left racist messages on the site. I haven’t actually seen the site, as the reports I’ve seen have, understandably, declined to reveal the site’s URL.

Thanks to Graham Linehan for naming them arseholes of the decade.

Wow, look at Cory Doctorow rant! Not that I disagree entirely, especially as I’m also a UK immigrant. He overstates the point a bit, and gets hysterical a lot, but his article does make me wonder what the hell is insidiously creeping up on us, viz. erosion of civil liberties, etc. It’s something that regularly makes the news, but only when you pull it all together and look at just how much we’re expected to swallow, bit by underhanded bit, do you get the full shocking picture. Is it time to flee the leftie camp and become a hard-core anarchist?

The Labour Party is unmaking Britain, turning it into the surveillance society that Britain’s foremost prophet of doom, George Orwell, warned against.

What fresh idiocy is this? ‘Eveywhere we look, the invisible spectrum is rainbows. This cannot be natural.’ What the hell is she talking about?

So soon after I spotted the McClaren interview, I find this. So enormously misguided.

Link to Guardian article.

I know little about football, and less about Steve McClaren, but when I heard about this cringe-inducing interview I made an immediate dash for YouTube.

Background: Steve (ex-English football manager) is interviewed by a Dutch TV channel, within weeks of becoming the manager for a Dutch football team, and in an effort to fit in, decides putting on an appalling Dutch accent is a good idea.

I’m sure there’s a lot to be said about this clip, but what strikes me most is the xenophobia angle. How can anyone be so clueless and ill-at-ease with the very idea of foreignness?

Well done to the Onion News Network for this spot-on send-up. Comparing George Bush to a hurricane. Genius.

George Bush has just signed a bill declaring the ANC is no longer a terrorist organisation. So now Mandela can apply for a via to visit the US. Hoorah! Condoleezza Rice has called the the affair ‘embarrassing’.

[Via presscue.com]

Above: Peter Akinola, Archbishop of Nigeria (left) with Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury. Akinola stands a good chance of becoming leader of the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans (Foca).

Perhaps feeling left out of a global trend towards religious fundamentalism, about half the Anglican Church is about to split from the ‘liberals’ among them, essentially over the issue of gays in the church. They also want a return to the 39 articles of religion (established in 1801) which include the denunciation of pacifism and the return of the death penalty. Ah yes, if there’s one thing wrong with organised religion, it’s that it’s not right-wing enough.

[Via The Guardian]

That’s right, a video camera that attaches to a gun so you can post videos on YouTube of all the people you’ve blown away. There’s a sample video to get people interested.

Apparently they’ve been developed to aid police accountability in the US (a good thing), but surely it’s just a matter of time before they’re available commercially (an insane thing).

[Via BoingBoing and Wired]

But wait, there’s more. In a recent statement on the South African government website, it’s noted that President Thabo Mbeki has been the target of some kind of media smear campaign, the poor dear. Apparently:

This year, as in the previous year, it appears as though there exists a disinformation campaign whereby all manner of fabrications are fed to the media.

What fabrications? Quoted in the same statement, the assertion that Mbeki and his goverment have ‘been secretly working to remove [President Robert Mugabe] from power’ through ‘lobbying for sustained international pressure to bear on the Mugabe regime’. Tut tut, what a horrible thing to say about someone.